Remember Me
by dinofire
Summary: When he wakes up, he finds himself shivering in a tattered orange sweater, the relentless wind biting into his weary bones. Then he realises he has no idea where, or who he is.
1. Chapter 1

**Title: **Remember Me

**Rating: **T

**Warning: **Swearing, violence

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><p>As the tendrils of slumber begin unravelling from Luke's vision, and he finds the snow-topped head of a crow mere inches away from his face. It gives a squawk, a tilt of the head, then delivers a sharp peck to the side of his cheek, the impact not quite as painful as he expects.<p>

A freezing gust rattles into his sore bones, icy ache surging through his shivering-wet body as he finds the strength to sit up, droplets of cold water slithering off his hair and clothes like snakes. The crow flutters off at the motion, Luke's vision following the its inky feathers as they fall off its wings and gently drift onto his torso.

_Damn. _

The soaked orange jumper he's wearing looks like it's been to hell and back. Faded reddish-brown marks were smeared all over it, the bits where it wasn't riddled with tears and holes.

Glancing over, he sees that he's next to a frozen-over river, a vast landscape of glossy ice beyond him. There's a rather large chunk missing from the ice. He has no idea how he got here, wherever 'here' was. A dense forest of pines was on the other side of the lake, the trees sturdy as brick walls against the howling breeze.

He tries to stand up, first pulling his left leg up to his chest-

An agonising pain shoots through his leg, and he's curled up into the snow again, back to where he started.

_Shit._

A coin-sized hole was ripped through the mangled mess that was his left knee. His failed attempt at standing up seemed to have reopened the injury, a light ring of red already visible around the fabric. It felt like somebody had literally poured salt into the wound, not to mention set it on fire.

There's an unfamiliar weight on his back.

_...The hell?_

His arm reaches over his shoulder. and his shivering fingers manage to grip around some sort of handle, or at least what his numb hands think is a handle.

He roughly pulls on the maybe-handle and damn near slices his head off.

_What the fuck?!_

The thinking, sentient part of him tells him to drop the blood-encrusted machete which has probably been involved in no less than twenty homicides, while a subconscious instinct he didn't know he had wills him to keep holding onto it.

He comes to a midway between the two and puts the machete back into the shoulder sheath. It feels different now, like it was meant to be there, but at the same time not.

After some swearing and numerous clumsy steps, he finally manages to stand up properly. He looks around, and there's nothing but the frozen lake, an eerie, barren whiteness, and screaming wind skittering across dried leaves. There's no civilisation or technology as far as his dry, stinging eyes can see. The painful truth smacks him like his ex-girlfriend.

_He's in the middle of bumfuck nowhere._

Under 'normal' circumstances, whatever that meant, Luke could have lost hours staring at the mesmerising sunset that engulfed the sky, dreaming up ways of how he could sketch and paint the maelstrom of clashing orange and azure onto paper.

"Help!" He shouts with whatever energy he has left, hoping for a response but not expecting one. Half of the word is swallowed up by hacking coughs and wheezes as his lungs screw up at the one thing they're supposed to do.

Several more short-breathed gasps and he gives up. He frantically scrambles through his pockets, desperately searching for his last link to civilisation.

_Where the hell is it? Oh god…_

_…Where the fuck is my phone?!_

He didn't exactly think it would work after being drenched in water. There probably wasn't any service out here anyway, but he would just feel somewhat safer to have it. Didn't really matter now. He's completely cut off from everything.

His two options were staying to sift through the clusterfuck of snow for his phone, or moving on. He considers for approximately four and a half seconds before deciding that leaving would be a much better idea.

As he limps along the snow-flooded bank, ice crunches beneath his feet, the coarse sound his only companion.

The reflection in the ice stares back at him as he glances over the familiar face that he's woken up to every day. A mop of messy brown hair that was in need of a haircut, square jaw, and a less-than-impressive stubble, a harsh reminder of his inability to grow a beard.

His skin was pale as death, but his eye circles were so dark and murky his eyeballs could have been planets floating around in deep space.

There was also what looked like a dead caterpillar underneath his nose.

"The hell?" He thinks out loud, the voice he hears much hoarser than it should be.

The '_thing'_ feels strange and scratchy against his strangely calloused fingers, his hands so rough and unfamiliar they might as well have been rocks.

_Dammit Luke, there is more important shit to be worryin' right now about than some sorry excuse for a moustache._

With everything that was going on, he was somewhat relieved that all of his face was still attached. However, he felt about fifty times worse than the morning after he discovered Nick had a higher alcohol capacity than him.

A small smile crawls up his numb cheeks at the thought of the memory, as his mind drifts to a happier place.

_Man, that was so long ago._

A few beers in, and Nick had preposed a challenge between the two, to see who could hold in more liquor. Luke's liver would have probably shrivelled up and died that night if Nick hadn't put a stop to his drinking binge and hauled his drunken ass back to their apartment. Despite the event occurring well over five years ago years ago, Nick still teased him, to this day, about all the shit he blabbered about in his alcohol-induced state.

Now, in Luke's defence, he _was, _admittedly, a lightweight, and Nick was not. But the thought of winning (with the possible side-effect of permanent liver failure) sounded a lot more appealing three drinks in.

The sudden thought of sheer hopelessness of his current situation shatters the mental scene.

With each other step sending a jolt of pain up his leg, and eyelids feeling as heavy as weights, he continues onwards, limping on the slippery ice.

A cloak of darkness slowly begun draping itself over the sky. Stars bloomed into life, dotting the black canvas that was the horizon.

He shambles along for what feels like decades before some sort of house finally grows into view, a beacon of hope amidst an ocean of desolation.

Making his way at a less-than-steady pace towards the building, he gets to about fifty meters from the house when he notices a girl sitting on the doorsteps, an assault rifle propped up next to her. She pulls out something from her pocket, and a small flicker of flame lights up in the darkness, revealing red hair in a ponytail, dark blue eyes, a skinny frame, and sorrow plastered into every feature.

She lights a cigarette, and her sadness releases in swirling puffs of smoke.

Her head shoots up at the sound of snow crunching under Luke's limp, eyes widening in fear. She looks over to the source of the noise, and her tired eyes swirl with a million different emotions.

She raises the gun and aims it at Luke.

He wants to shout "Stop! Please, I just need some help!" but all that comes out is a garbled groan, his throat frozen with dehydration.

The reflection of red embers glow in her frozen tears.

And she pulls the trigger.

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><p>The world goes spinning as the bullet shreds into the flesh of his shoulder, pain exploding like electricity through every nerve in his body. The sky swallows up his vision as he topples over, hard snow slamming into his back.<p>

Doors slam open, and the gruff voice of a man echoes through the night.

"_What the fuck did you do?!"_

It's is the last thing Luke hears before unconsciousness coils around his mind and takes its hold.

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><p><strong>AN:** Hope you liked chapter one of my first fanfic. Just to clarify, Luke doesn't lose memory of his entire identity, just the time in the walker apocalypse. Next part should be up within the next few days or week. Rate/Reviews will be appreciated :)


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: **Mega late with this, sorry. I was actually planning to finish and upload chapter 2 on Halloween, but I was just lazy and never bothered. Over the next few days/weeks, I' going to update Chapter 1 with more description and scenes/?lines?. Thank you to the awesome Lilacsbloom for the help :)

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><p>Muffled sobbing is the unwelcome hand that drags him out of his sleep.<p>

His eyelids snap open, waiting in terror of the million possible things that could happen next.

Nothing but a weak crackling of a fireplace, the pathetic flames inside desperately grasping to stay alive just for a little longer despite its inevitable end.

For a second, it seemed like everything that had happened was just a nightmare. But as his looks around, he sees the redhead girl sleeping opposite to him against a windowsill, the scenery outside still drowned in darkness. She's no more than a few feet away.

He stands up, silent as a shadow, praying to every god he could think of that she wouldn't wake up. A sharp ache in his shoulder causes him to instinctively grab at it in a futile attempt at dulling the pain.

The floorboards creak as he makes an unsteady step.

S_hitshitshitshit._

Luckily, she didn't notice.

The sobbing suddenly cuts off, as though its owner didn't want to be found.

He knows from every horror movie he's watched that investigating mysterious crying is a shitty idea and would guarantee you get killed, but he ain't got a goddamn clue where to go. His heart skips a beat, and his stomach flips as he sees what's beyond the corner.

_Jesus._

The kid couldn't have been more than sixteen.

Skeletal hands were bound to the staircase's railings, broken glasses cracked like his soul. A haunting blend of grief and grudge was seared upon his swollen, bloodied face. The second his bloodshot eyes notice Luke, he desperately tries to back into the wall.

"Hey, hey, kid, calm down, I'm tryin'a help you-"

"No, no, please, leave me alone!" He pleads in a whimpering voice, tears flooding down his face.

"L-look, see? No weapons." Luke whispers as he raises his hands in a frantic attempt to shush the kid, his heart damn near bursting out of his chest at the thought of the psycho redhead waking from the commotion.

His expression softens a little bit and he stops squirming.

"What's your name? I'm Luke."

Confusion is written his face for a few seconds, before he catches on and replies.

"A-Arvo, my name is Arvo."

"A'ight Arvo, I'm gonna get you outta here. J-just hold on a little while longer, okay?"

Luke's eyes dart around the empty room, desperately searching for something, _anything,_ to sever Arvo's bindings with. There's nothing but busted-open crates, a coat-hanger, and the mist of his panicked breaths, evaporating rapidly like any prospect of hope he has left.

_Shit._

An idea flashes before his mind.

_No. No way in hell._

_…There's no other way, goddammit._

He takes a deep, anxious breath, the air sinking like stones to the bottom of his lungs.

_A'ight Luke, you can do this._

The machete makes a slick '_shiiing'_ sound as he releases it from the sheath, the putrid stench of rotten blood now even worse after being exposed to warm air.

The blade now feels swift as a brush in his hand.

The fact that it does terrifies him.

Arvo's expression contorts into horrified fear at the sight of the blood-stained claw.

"Okay kid… Now I'm just gonna…uh…d-don't move okay? J-just stay still. I don't wanna hurt you by accident." Luke murmurs, not sure who exactly he was trying to reassure.

Arvo obeys, and his body relaxes.

The machete makes a quick job of the rope, and Arvo's arms are free within seconds.

The kid's miraculously able to stand up by himself despite being beaten half to death and only having one good leg.

"What, uh, what…" Arvo mutters to himself in a foreign language before finding the right words. "What happen to shoulder?"

"This?" Luke gestures at his left shoulder, a piss-poor job of bandaging hastily wrapped over the wound. "Carrot-top by the fireplace over there. Shot me." He cringes at the memory, the wound still burning like hell.

"What? Carrot-top? She does not have vegetable for head."

Luke chuckles, before replying. "Nah, it's-it's just a- nevermind. We need to get the hell outta here, _pronto._"

Tiny, spluttering coughs emanate from a small box by the fireplace. If Luke and Arvo had been a step further out the door, they would have missed it.

"Holy shit, is that a baby in there?"

Arvo shrugs, and continues walking.

"The hell's wrong with you man, we can't just leave an innocent baby with these psychos!"

Luke carefully retraces his steps back to the fireplace, remembering to skip the creaky floorboard, and finally reaches the box. There _was_ a baby inside. It was an infant, no more than a few days old, wrapped in a gritty green blanket. _Fuckin' hell. Where, and who the hell did they steal this from, out here in the middle'a nowhere? _His shoulder burns as he bends his arm to pick the baby up, the weight almost nonexistent.

"Okay, now we've really gotta go."

A tidal wave of freezing air smacks them as they open the door and step onto the snow. Luke couldn't really tell how long it was between now and the time he got shot. Could'a been hours, could'a been days. Shit, maybe even weeks.

"Arvo, you gotta phone? Know where we could, I dunno, get help? "

"What are you talking? There is no phone. No help."

"Oh, uh… okay, whatever that means. We should find somewhere safe and rest. I'm tired as shit. Not too close to this hellhole, though."

The bleak darkness didn't really help with visibility as they exited the building and made their way across the barren whiteness. Eventually, Luke spots someone in the distance. For some reason, the guy was just standing there in the cold, his posture limp, clothes ripped to shreds.

"Arvo, there's a guy over there."

"_No, no,_ _no_. He is monster."

A siren's wail explodes from the baby's lips.

The guy turns around, and _holy fucking shit_, his face was practically torn and shredded clean off, patches of his skin rotten, hanging on by threads. He starts limping towards them, his motion as though every bone in his body was broken.

"What the fuck?!"

Somehow, Arvo wasn't even fazed by the living nightmare making its way towards them.

"What do you mean? Only one. You can use sword."

"Are you fucking crazy? No way in hell I'm going near that thing!"

Arvo gives Luke a look like _he's_ the one in the wrong.

"W-we should just go. Get the fuck outta here. Can you run?"

"Uh, little bit."

And so they ran off quickly as they could (or at least as quickly as Arvo could) in the opposite direction, the haunting groans of the creature slowly fading out of existence.

"Hey, Arvo, look. Some sort'a cave or somethin'. Maybe we could rest there."

A hole was dug into the sloped snow, the entrance partially entombed and covered with snow. It would have easily gone unnoticed had Luke not been scared shitless and desperate for shelter.

"Looks like a bear den, I think. We should all be able to fit. Here, hold the baby. I'll check if nothing's inside."

Luke takes a deep breath, and once again pulls the machete out. His arm shakes, terrified of both himself and what lies inside the cave.

"Okay, okay… It's just a thing. Nothing to be scared of."

You could practically hear the look on Arvo's face saying "What the fuck are you smoking?"

Luke's eyes were now able to see somewhat clearly in the darkness, after being drowned in it for so long. His shaking grip around the handle tightens as he enters the cave, tired brown eyes darting around in every direction.

Luckily, the cave's empty.

"All clear, Arvo."

A few minutes of uncomfortable shuffling and baby-passing later, they somehow manage to all fit inside the cave. Awkwardness was heavy in the air, clinging to the crumbly walls as the crammed space forced them to huddle together. At least the baby wasn't crying anymore. It cooed gently in Luke's aching arms, the sound a lullaby in their cold, numb ears.

"Uh, well, I guess we're safe for now. That was, uh, one hell of a day. Or week. Shit, I don't even know anymore." His mind was spinning, unable to think straight from the sheer strain and overwork his body had endured.

"...What the hell are we going to do with you?" Luke mutters as he looks down at the baby.

Arvo simply gave a tiny nod, too exhausted to even look up at Luke.

"So… I know you're… beat to shit and all, and-and I'm really sorry, but please, I just really need some answers. So…uh… where...how did I get here?"

But Arvo was already asleep. Even though he was relaxed, you could still see the trauma written on every feature in the form of scars and bruises, erratic mists of breath. He twitched at the tiniest sound, the terror still plaguing him in his nightmares. Luke could tell Arvo's unconscious state was light and uneasy, his mind alert, ready to spring awake and make a run for it at the slightest sign of danger.

A sigh.

"I'm sorry this happened to you."

And for the first time in what felt like forever, Luke steps willingly into the darkness.

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><p>And when he wakes up, the first thing he sees is the familiar mist of his labored breaths.<p>

Then he realizes something's wrong.

Arvo and the baby were gone.


End file.
